Every night at the ballpark is still a Field of Dreams for the San Diego Chicken, a beautiful celebration of baseball's spirit at its most pure and innocent.
But for Ted Giannoulas, the London native who in 1974 created the character that may just be one of the best icons in sports mascot history, the world has changed over the years.
My, how it has changed, how it's become more complicated and a lot less fun.
Try bringing a big, yellow chicken suit on a flight from your California home to, say, Rochester or Amarillo. With the baggage restrictions and security concerns? He's been forced to leave most of his props behind.
And the major-league players, with their huge contracts? And the big-time owners with their nasty labour tactics? And the crowds, filled with guys in suits trying to impress some client?
It's not the same anymore, not like it was in the '70s, when a young man in a chicken suit enlivened crowds at San Diego Padres games and altered the live sports experience in a way few people ever have.
"It's not the end of the road yet, but I can see it from here," Giannoulas, just turned 56, said of his career.
But God bless the minor leagues. There are seven minor-pro teams for every one in the majors, and it's in those loops that the Chicken makes most of his six-figure annual salary, hitting about 50 games a year -- it used to be 250 -- and enjoying a few hours each night that feel like the old days.
"The boys-of-summer spirit still exists in the minor leagues," he said. "I'll tell you why the minor leagues are way more enjoyable -- you don't get the corporate crowd coming out as much.
"You get the blue-collar, true baseball fan who can still get the great seats. I'm dealing with fans who come out for a good time and not someone wining and dining a client."
Giannoulas grew up on Essex St. and attended Central secondary school before moving late in high school with his family to San Diego. As a college kid, he was hired in 1974 to dress like a chicken for a local radio station's promotions -- and he eventually became so popular, he was hired to work Padres games.
During a 1978 tour of big-league cities, the billionaire owner of the Atlanta Braves, Ted Turner, offered Giannoulas $100,000 to become his team's full-time mascot. The potential move was front-page news in San Diego.
His popularity exploding and his desire to become a free bird growing, Giannoulas became ensnared in a legal fight with the radio station over the character's trademark. The station, KGB, hired someone to replace him -- prompting boos from thousands at a Padres game and even resulting in threats against the station, according to a 1979 Sports Illustrated article.
Giannoulas won his independence, changing his character's name to the Famous Chicken, and celebrated with the Great Hatching -- he broke out of a giant egg before nearly 50,000 cheering Padres fans as the theme song from 2001: A Space Odyssey played.
The game was started nearly an hour late to make time for the event.
"Then the word got out -- the Chicken was box-office gold, you have to have him," Giannoulas says.
He's toured the sports circuit every year since -- though he took a sabbatical in 2005 -- making a six-figure annual salary with gags and jokes that involve the players, umpires and fans.
One of his favourites? He takes a few young fans, dresses them in chicken outfits and has them follow his moves around the field, slapping the catcher's butt, putting a curse on the visiting team, pretending to pee on the umpire.
He's been doing that one so long, some of the little kids he's used are now major leaguers themselves: Nick Swisher, an outfielder with the New York Yankees, reminded Giannoulas recently that as a four-year-old he was a "baby chick" during a Tidewater Tides game in Norfolk, Va.
"He told me that was the proudest his mother has ever been of him on a ball diamond," Giannoulas says.
Though he loves kids, Giannoulas was too busy with work over the past four decades to have any of his own. Married to his wife, Jane, since 1995, he's thinking more and more about calling it a career.
And when he retires, the Chicken's going with him.
"I have not been training anybody," he says. "I don't think anybody brings the passion, the character.
"If I thought it was trainable, I'd train 50 people and send one to every state."
There will be at least one more summer for the Chicken. Upon retirement, Giannoulas plans to write a memoir, maybe even a screenplay, about his career.
"I'm definitely thinking of coming back for (2010), but one year at a time," he says. "I've spanned four decades and nobody can play forever."
patrick.maloney@sunmedia.ca
